Many electronic commerce systems using the Internet are based on a “shopping cart” model allowing the selection of various items from an electronic catalog. The shopping cart model allows a purchaser to view items in an electronic catalog and select items for purchase by metaphorically adding the items to a shopping cart. When the purchaser is done selecting items, all of the items in the shopping cart are “checked out” (i.e., the order is submitted). The purchaser then typically provides order information, such as payment and shipment information. Often, such systems also allow a user to check the status of a previously placed order.
Many prior art enhancements to such systems have generally been directed to increasing ease of use by the user, i.e., by reducing the number of pages that must be viewed, or the number of cursor manipulations required to be performed to complete the transaction. In such systems, each user is assigned a unique user ID. This user ID is sent to the server, e.g., manually entered or retrieved from a cookie placed on the client computer system, and can be used to access purchaser-specific information, e.g., in a database on the server. However, implementing a unique user ID in a corporate requisition environment can in some instances be burdensome for system administrator, particularly where there is a large number of employees, or where a high turn over rate of employees requires new accounts to be continually set up by an administrator. Accordingly, the present invention provides a work site based ordering system for effecting and inquiring into the status of requisitions for fulfillment materials and the like which overcomes the above problems and others.